One moment he could feel the warmth of Cordelia's enticing curves sliding against his own skin, the next he fell down on to the cold, hard ground, alone. He closed his eyes against the familiar pain. If anything it was worse to lose her this time, now that he had truly loved her, made his dreams a reality. He wanted to roar out his grief, give his demon full sway, but he knew Cordy wouldn't approve. More than anything he hated to disappoint her. He looked around dully at the swirling mist, wondering how long it would be before the spell, or whatever it was, yanked him back into his bleak reality. Maybe it had all been just a dream, the fevered yearnings of a tortured soul...
No, he could still smell her perfume on his skin. He inhaled deeply, hints of sandalwood, vanilla and something else that was uniquely Cordy. He let out the breath in a helpless sigh.
"Are you done feeling sorry for yourself yet?" a voice floated out of the mist.
Angel leapt to his feet, instantly alert. "Who's there? Show yourself."
"I think you're showing enough for the both of us," the voice observed wryly. Angel looked down and realised he was still naked. He grabbed his pants and yanked them on impatiently.
"Happy now?" he said from between clenched teeth. "Who are you and what have you done with Cordy?"
"She's safe. We just needed to talk to you alone."
Angel scowled. He had a bad feeling about this. "What about?"
"About Cordelia. And just how far you're willing to go to get her back."
Angel stood in shocked silence. Get her back? Have his Cordy returned to him? There had to be a catch...
"I'll do whatever it takes," he said slowly. "But then you already know that, right?"
"Possibly. You have certainly shown a sense of noble self-sacrifice at some fairly inopportune moments in the past. The Darla debacle, for instance. We nearly didn't manage to fix that one in time. As it is, we had to give you the child in return for your sacrifice. The rules of the Trial are quite firm in that respect."
Angel clenched his fists by his side. "Yeah, and then you took him right back off me again. I still haven't forgiven you for that. In fact, why don't you come out here so I can hit you?"
"It was necessary," the voice said solemnly. "He was too important to risk in the cross-fire of your crusade. Those you fight would not hesitate to use him to get to you. Never fear, warrior – his time will come."
"So, how do I know you wouldn't take Cordy right back again as well? Why should I trust you people when you've never given me any reason to?"
"The resurrection would be complete. She would be your responsibility to protect, and though others may try to take her from you, we would not."
"Then what do I have to do?" Angel said. "What's the price?"
"The same as in the Trial. An eye for an eye, a life for a life."
"I don't have a life, remember?" Angel said through gritted teeth. "I'm already dead."
"But someday you will live again," the voice reminded him, "according to the prophecy." It paused for a moment, allowing him to reflect. "That is the price we ask. You must be willing to surrender your chance at reaching shanshu. In return for her life, you must give up all hope of ever having one of your own."
Angel closed his eyes. His dream. He wouldn't be able to see the sun, to have a family, grow old... But Cordy would, and that was more important. "I'll do it," he said. "Just bring her back. Please."
* * * * * * * *
"Don't cry, sweetie. It'll all seem better in the morning."
Cordelia raised her head and stared through her tears at the peculiar figure standing next to her. The woman appeared to be around late middle-age and she wore a toga-y type of thing in white. Her hair, however, was a vivid stop-light red. She was holding out a similar robe to Cordy, who took it with a sad little laugh. "How am I supposed to tell the difference?" she said. "There is no day and night here. Just endless, monotonous, foggy whiteness."
"Do you miss the sun?" the woman asked.
Cordy nodded, draping the toga around herself. "Yeah. I never really thought about it until I didn't get to see it any more. Angel must miss it every day." She sniffled a little at the thought of the vampire, before swiping a hand across her eyes and sternly applying the poised Cordy facade. She walked over to the woman. "Do I know you?" she asked pointedly.
"Oh, no, honey. Friend of a friend, you might say." The woman had a mischievous twinkle in her grass-green eyes and Cordelia had the peculiar feeling she wasn't in on the joke, whatever it was. "You and I need to have a little chat."
"Uh-huh," Cordy said. "About what exactly? No, let me guess. About how you let me have a glimpse of true heaven, just so you could rip it away from me and send me back to The Unbearable Whiteness of Being here?"
"Well, it's sort of in that general area, yes," the woman said, with a worried frown wrinkling her pale brow. "In that it's about you and the hunky vampire."
"What about us?"
"Well, what would you say to the thought of going back?"
"Back? To LA? To Angel? Alive?"
"All of the above," the woman smirked.
"Well, of course I... woah, woah, wait a minute there. I know how this works." Cordy jabbed a finger towards the woman. "What's the catch? There's gonna be a loophole somewhere, isn't there? Like, maybe, I get to go back but only for one day every hundred years or something, like that little Irish town..."
"If you mean Brigadoon, dearie, I think you'll find it's Scottish..." the woman ventured.
"Whatever," Cordy said, waving a hand dismissively. "Is that sort of thing likely to happen here? 'Cause not loving the idea."
"Don't worry. Your return would be permanent." The woman paused and looked at Cordy with her disconcertingly direct stare. "There is a condition, however."
"Ha, I knew it," Cordy muttered.
"In return for the gift of your life, Angel has to be willing to sacrifice his own chance at life as a human."
Cordy gaped at the red-haired woman. "What? Are you kidding me? You can't ask him to do that! He's damn well earned that reward! And there's no way in Hell," she cast a quick glance skywards, "sorry!... that I'm ever gonna let you take it away from him. It's my life, so I should be the one making the sacrifice. Angel's made enough of them for you people as it is."
"Then you would rather stay here?"
Cordy looked down at her bare feet, peeking out from under her robe. She hated it here, hated the monotony and the dreary sameness stretching out into eternity. She wanted bright colours, strong flavours, the wind in her hair... and Angel in her arms. She closed her eyes and she could almost feel how it had been to be so close to him. If she did this, she would most likely never see him again. He would continue to fight the good fight, attain his reward, maybe even get married and have a bunch of little dark-eyed rugrats. Oh, god, it hurt to think of him having all that with someone else, but it hurt more to think of depriving him of that chance, that future. She just couldn't do that to him.
"Yes," she said quietly. "I'd rather stay here." She looked up at the woman, who was watching her with an air of quiet melancholy. "But, please, can I at least see him once more? Get a chance to say a proper goodbye? We just... we never had that."
The woman regarded her closely for a moment and then nodded. Cordy almost sagged in relief. "Alright. You can have one day together. Twenty-four hours and then we do our worst."
"Thank you," Cordy said, going over and gripping the woman's hands impulsively. "You don't know what this means..."
"Oh, I think I have a vague idea," Fleur said, smiling faintly.
* * * * * * * *
"Ain't nobody else the least bit suspicious?" Gunn muttered, glaring over at the self-proclaimed medium who was deep in conversation with Willow. "How do we know this whacko's who she says she is? She could be working with the evil lawyers for all we know."
"Do you really think I haven't thought of that?" Wesley replied testily. "But Willow seems to trust her and, until we have evidence to the contrary, we'll just have to do the same."
"Seems to me like making Angel vanish into thin air's evidence enough," Fred ventured to suggest. She rubbed her left hand uneasily. "Gave me chills, don't mind tellin' ya."
"Are you all right?" Wesley was instantly solicitous. "It must have been extremely unsettling for you."
"I'm fine. Ain't the strangest thing I've seen, ya know."
"Yeah, well, it's still pretty high up there on the strange-ometer," Gunn said, "and I'm tired of pretending nothing's gone down here." With that he strode off towards Fleur, with Wesley and Fred scurrying along behind. "Yo, lady! You wanna tell us where you whooshed our friend off to?"
Fleur exhibited a complete lack of surprise at the young man's outburst. "I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to tell you that," she said, "but he's with his young lady and quite safe."
"Young lady? You mean Cordelia?" Wes asked. Fleur nodded. "But how is that possible? I don't understand how his physical body could be transported to such a place..." he trailed off, considering the ramifications.
"You'll understand eventually," the old woman replied, not unkindly.
"I'm sure it'll be fine," Willow said. "Fleur promised me that nothing bad will happen to him there. In fact, he'll be back here real soon."
"Indeed," Fleur said, checking her watch. "Very soon, actually. We'd better resume our positions. Don't want anything to interfere with the process."
"What happens if something interferes with the process?" Fred asked warily, not sure she really wanted to know the answer.
"Oh, reality as we know it will cease to exist," Fleur said chirpily. "But don't worry, that almost never happens."
Wes, Fred and Gunn exchanged a look and walked back over to their original positions. The group joined hands again, all except Fred and Fleur who left a space for Angel between them.
"Incende," Fleur said and the bowl in the centre of the circle lit up once more with an eerie blue-green light, making them all jump.
"Did you see how she...?" Gunn whispered.
"No idea," Wesley said. "Just pretend you didn't notice."
"Concentrate please, boys," Fleur admonished them and they subsided into silence, only the flicker of the flames penetrating the discomforting hush. They sat there for long minutes, afraid to twitch so much as a muscle in case it threw off the spell. Just when they were almost squirming with the need to move, a cold wind blew through the room, raising goose-bumps on their skin and sending shivers down their spines. Scared to open their eyes, they sat frozen until Fleur spoke again. "You can look now," she said, and they did.
In the centre of the circle, where the bowl had been, there was a familiar dark-haired figure in a white robe. She was huddled almost into a ball but there was no mistaking who she was and the group inhaled collectively in shock. All but one.
Returned to his position within the circle, Angel opened his eyes and gazed upon the woman he loved. Rising and crossing to the place where she lay, he knelt before her and stroked her hair, willing her to look at him. When she did, it was as if his heart started to beat again. He smiled at her bemused expression before clasping her face gently between his hands and kissing her tenderly, uncaring of the curious looks from the others.
"Okay, is everybody else seeing what I'm seeing?" Gunn whispered. "The princess is back from the dead and making out with the friendly neighbourhood vampire?"
"It would appear so," Wesley said, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. "It's really rather romantic, isn't it?"
Fred sighed heavily. "Moira," she said, in tones of great satisfaction.
"Come again?" Gunn shot her a confused look.
"Never mind."
* * * * * * * *
Cordelia kept her eyes tightly closed as the wind blew around her, afraid of what she would see if she opened them. Then it died down and she heard the astonished murmurs from all around her and she still couldn't bring herself to open her eyes just in case it was all a dream.
It was the gentle hand stroking her hair that brought her out of her self-imposed cocoon. She'd recognise that touch anywhere – no one else could make her tingle right down to her toes. She looked up slowly and saw his glorious smile before he bent down and kissed her.
It was a chaste kiss compared to the heated embraces they had shared in heaven, purgatory or whatever that place had been, and yet Cordelia felt it right down to her soul. If she'd been of a fanciful turn of mind, she'd have thought he was bringing her back to life with that kiss, like in a fairy tale. But she was no Sleeping Beauty and the spell was due to kick in again in just twenty-four little hours. No matter what the prince might do.
But she refused to think about that now. She had one whole day to spend with the man she loved – yeah, there was no point in pretending any more that she wasn't in love with him – and she was determined to make enough memories to last through eternity. God knew she'd need something to get her through the dreary monotony.
She opened her eyes again and stared into that beloved face, the eyes searching her expression anxiously. She grinned up at him, determined he wouldn't know until he absolutely had to. She wasn't going to give him a chance to barter away his chance for happiness.
He smiled then, obviously relieved to see she was okay. His hands were still on her face, stroking her as if he couldn't believe she was real. She brought her own hands up to grasp his and held them tight. "Hi, honey," she said, with a whimsical little laugh. "I'm home."